The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "venture capital" ...
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A million LIttle Pixels
Kansas City's Pitch Weekly reporter David Martin pokes holes in claims made by entrepreneur John FLowers, who got $500,000 in venture capital support from Kansas state's Kansas Technology Enterprise Corporation.
Tags: Kozoru; background checks; venture capital; skunk works; computer hacker; DefCon; network security; Hiverworld; nCircle; natural language; Kansas Technology Enterprise Corporation; KTEC; OPen Prairie Equity Partners; David Warthen; Ridgely Evers; Ask Jeeves; open records; instant messaging; mobile devices; cell phone; Wikipedia; Industry Ventures; reality-challenged statements
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This man made $500 million disappear...
An Esquire investigation reveals how a con man, Reed Slatkin, convinced wealthy people to hand him millions of dollars. Slatkin started an elite art group, Sing Like Hell, which brought prominent singers and songwriters to perform for music lovers in Santa Barbara. The article describes how many new-establishment aristocrats got interested in the so-called "capital venture for the soul." They invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Slatkin's new fund that was supposed to get them significantly higher return than the rates typically paid by money-market funds. The scheme, known as one of the biggest investment frauds in American history, has been a fifteen-year operation involving as many as 850 investors, the magazine reports.
Tags: Scientology; Earthlink; Hollywood; WISE (World Institute of Scientology Enterprises); Security and Exchange Commission (SEC); business; bankruptcy
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The Biotech Bet
Governing reports on "cultivating biotechnology" as a major economic development objective in Arkansas. The story looks at finances behind the biotech research and development efforts throughout the country. The article details initiatiatives coming from the business and the academic world, but also examines "the public sector's role in helping fledgling enterprises to thrive." The report describes methods of pumping capital into money-starved biotech companies, and some competitive advantages of small cities that are not amongst the largest biotech incubators.
Tags: genetics; research; medicine; farming; agriculture; venture capital funds; tax-credits; high-tech; National Rice Research Center; pharmaceuticals; FDA; labor; PhD
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The Great Internet Money Game
Business Week looks at how "America's top financial firms reaped billions from the Net boom, while investors got burned." The investigation reveals that some of the best respected investment bankers - Merrill Lynch, Robertson Stephens, Credit Suisse First Boston and Goldman Sachs - have stayed "behind some of the biggest losers," but still have profited, as "they took their cash up front, grabbing a slice of the dough raised in IPOs." The story details how venture capitalists have neglected old rules of thumbs and - in the words of one venture fund manager - "shamelessly took companies public that never should have been taken public." The report also exposes analysts' lateness in downgrading the stocks of the failing Internet companies.
Tags: Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC); Wall Street; stock exchange; profits; investors; investment bankers; venture capital; business
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IPOs: a Rigged Game
A Bloomberg News investigation details "how Wall Street has rigged the $50-billion-a-year initial public offering (IPO) business, favoring powerful and well-connected money managers at the expense of legions of small investors." The series shed light on "who was benefiting from the steep stock rises." The reports include "a rare behind-the scene examination into the multi-million-dollar business of raising money for U.S. corporations," as they reveal how the system provides "a select group of underwriters, brokers and investors with an opportunity to capture enormous profits." The investigation also documents how "company executives profit from IPOs - often at the expense of their own companies."
Tags: TAPE; DISKETTE; SEC; investment banks; attorneys; mutual funds; commissions; CEOs; venture capital; shares; equity
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No title (id: 10977)
"Kingdom of Pat" explored the business enterprises of the television minister Pat Robertson and detailed the ways in which he amassed the personal fortuen that, in turn, helped support his varied political agendas. Prime Time also examined a failed and troubled Robertson venture which attmepted to capitalize on th millions of Christian followers of his television ministry.
Tags: Steven Reiner; Brian Ross Tape
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No title (id: 8328)
Charleston Gazette reveals how coal companies avoid paying environmental fines for pollution by fraudulent bankruptcy schemes and abuse of state venture capital tax credits; finds regulators do not do their jobs, thus allowing the coal companies to avoid $1.35 million in unpaid fines, 1991.
Tags: None
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Solar-power tax break lured investors to buy shady deal, IRS says
Wall Street Journal article on a California solar energy corporation being sued by the Justice Department for fraud finds the difference between fraudulent deception and technical failure a fine distinction; investors claim they were bilked but company says it had in good faith sought venture capital for an idea that happened to fail, June 9, 1986.
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No title (id: 3674)
New Republic tells the story of a poverty program that works; details how the Shorebank Corporation (consisting of a bank, a real estate development corporation, a small venture capital firm and the Neighborhood Institute) turned around one neighborhood in Chicago; tells how it kept the area from slipping into disrepair without gentrifying it, and how the bank remained afloat with "development deposits," made by institutions and wealthy individuals sharing the bank's social goals, May 8, 1989.
Tags: None